


I Look Into The Future (And All I See Is You)

by Telaryn



Series: The Hero and The Bad Boy [34]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Arguing, Boys In Love, Boys Kissing, Family, Honesty, Jealousy, Lack of Communication, M/M, Makeup Sex, Non-Explicit, Relationship Problems, Self Confidence Issues, Self-Doubt, Sex, Sexual Tension, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-20
Updated: 2015-07-20
Packaged: 2018-04-10 07:12:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,662
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4382246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Telaryn/pseuds/Telaryn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Clint tries to have a sit-down with Tony to establish some relationship boundaries, but once again it appears everyone has Clint Barton figured out better than he does himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Look Into The Future (And All I See Is You)

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know why it is - every time I come back to these two, the thought of ending it all just makes me sad.
> 
> But end it I shall in the next/final installment. Once again, thank you to everyone who has continued on this journey with me.

Not for nothing was Tony Stark considered a genius. Even in the dim light of the bar, Clint could see the microscopic shifts in his expression as he figured out what was really going on. To his credit, he figured it out nearly a minute before Clint had thought he would.

“Quinn…ah…isn’t here, is he?” It was as much statement as question as Stark eased into the booth opposite Clint.

“No,” the archer confirmed, “but I gotta say I’m impressed with how fast you showed up when you thought it was him.” All right, so he couldn’t keep _all_ the bitterness out of his voice. He’d only promised Nat and Quinn that he would be civil and open minded – not that he would pretend he was okay with how many lines Tony had been crossing recently. “Outfit’s spot on too. He’d have liked it.”

Stark studied him for a long moment, then relaxed into his seat, signaling a passing waitress. “You’re not looking for a fight, or we would be having this discussion someplace else,” he said. “Scotch rocks,” he told the waitress, “and another of whatever my friend here is drinking.” Clint pushed his bottle towards her with two fingers and she swept it up without missing a beat.

“You’re right,” Clint said once they were alone again, leaning back in his seat. “I don’t want to argue. I don’t want this to turn into some big dramatic thing.” He sighed. “Your crush on him, his crush on you – it’s really never bothered me.”

Tony snorted. “Could’ve fooled me.” The waitress returned with their drinks. When they were alone again he continued, “I know the relationship signs, Legolas. You don’t want him spending time alone with me, you don’t like that I support him, and I’m pretty sure if you thought he could get another job like what I’ve given him you’d insist that he quit working for me.”

The real bitch of it was that he wasn’t precisely _wrong_. In fact, he’d hit on pretty much every reason Clint had finally pushed for this sit down. _I don’t want to be that guy,_ he thought, staring Stark down, _but you make it so easy._ “You know, there’s a part of me that wishes you hadn’t been so fucking noble the first time he kissed you. Maybe if you’d just fucked that first night you would have gotten something out of your system.”

“It wasn’t me he wanted,” Tony said. The waitress returned with their drinks, and without looking at her, he passed over his card. “Start a tab, sweetheart.” When they were alone again he continued, “I could see that even before he said it. I don’t go where I’m not wanted.”

“You do go where you’re needed though,” Clint said, taking a swig of his beer. “Or where you think you’re needed. I’ve been working this over in my head, and I at least got to kill one of the bastards that raped Quinn. Even the thing you were able to do for him by raising the alarm, Phil came in right at the perfect moment and stole your thunder.”

Tony was as serious as Clint had ever seen him. “I’m not some kind of glory-hound when it comes to be the people I care about, Clint. The important thing was finding Quinn and saving him.”

“But from who?” Clint asked, seeing his opening and charging in. “Because from where I’m sitting, ever since Badria turned up pregnant, you’ve been on a mission to save Quinn from me.”

Silence fell between them. Tony drained his drink and slid it to the edge of the table. Clint watched, seeing the wheels turning in his friend’s mind. “You can’t put this all on me,” Stark said at last. “No,” he went on, when Clint opened his mouth to response. “You’ve been against the idea of that little girl from minute one. Quinn needed to know that his feelings for his daughter were legitimate.”

Anger swelled in Clint’s chest – the kind he felt only rarely these days, and never for his friends or people he cared about. “I have _never_ said he was wrong for feeling a connection to his child. _Never._ I do seem to be one of the only people aside from his shrink trying to get him to remember that any sort of relationship with his daughter ties him to his _rapist_ for the rest of his life.”

“You blaming a three month old baby for the actions of her psycho mother? Nice, Barton.”

It hadn’t felt good when Natasha had finally called him on his issues with Quinn’s daughter. It felt worse when Stark did it. “Quinn and I have to come up with a compromise we can both live with,” he said, his frustration overwhelming him. “I’m trying to work through my issues with the baby, but every time I turn around I’m tripping over you. It’s got to stop, Tony! We’re getting married, for Christ’s sake!”

“You’re clinging to that like it’s going to suddenly solve everything,” Tony said, his expression suddenly terrifyingly serious. “You know, from where I’m sitting, I’m not your problem. Not entirely,” he conceded in the face of Clint’s raised eyebrow.

“But you’re not helping either,” Clint said, massaging his temples. “Tony, do you really not get how much space you take up in a situation?”

“Look,” Tony said, setting his empty glass down and signaling for another, “you’re starting to sound like you’re jealous of me, so I know you’re not thinking straight. He loves _you_ , Clint. The two of you have been through hell and Phil Coulson and you’re still together. The way you look at each other when you forget there are other people in the room..?” Nodding his thanks at their waitress, he tossed off half his drink in one swallow. “It’s disgusting.”

There was pain in his eyes as he said it though – more pain than Clint would have thought Stark was capable of showing in public. “You ever hear the saying ‘love isn’t enough’?” Clint asked, feeling the balance of power in the conversation shift and wondering precisely when he’d lost control.

“Bullshit,” Tony countered. “What are you really scared of?”  
************************************  
“This is ridiculous,” Quinn said, trying to settle and completely failing. Seated at a small table in the corner of the bedroom, Natasha Romanoff calmly turned over another card. “What exactly do you think I’m going to do?”

“Something stupid,” she said, without bothering to look up from her game.

The bitch of it was, he couldn’t really argue with her. His imagination was definitely not his friend when it came to wondering how Clint’s talk with Tony was going. _”Aside from snapping at him, I haven’t actually sat down and talked to Tony about everything that’s happened. That’s not fair to him, and I’m pretty sure it’s made things worse between us.”_

Again, an uncomfortably true assessment of their situation. Quinn hadn’t come out and said that he didn’t want Clint to confront Tony, but really – he didn’t have to.

“Should have fucked him when you had the chance.” Natasha turned over another card – winning whatever mutant version of solitaire she’d been playing – then began gathering up the cards.

Quinn sighed. “You’re not exactly the first person to mention that.” Once upon a time he’d gotten himself dangerously, maudlin drunk and kissed Tony Stark. He’d been certain he was about to lose Clint to a recently returned Phil Coulson, and acting on his crush seemed like a better choice than dealing with his fear of a life without Clint Barton.

Her task finished, Natasha settled back in her chair and gave Quinn her full attention. “So why didn’t you?”

The last thing Quinn had ever expected on kissing Stark was to discover that his feelings were reciprocated. Being attracted to a billionaire, genius, playboy, philanthropist was like having a crush on an actor or rock star, and even drunk as he’d been Quinn remembered feeling like he was about to dive off a very tall cliff. “I wish I could say it was because of something I did or some choice I made,” he admitted finally, “but really nothing happened because Tony didn’t want to take advantage of the situation…or me,” he added.

Natasha’s expression had gone quiet, and very serious. “Jonah, why are you marrying him?” she asked, before the silence could become uncomfortable.

Quinn sat on the edge of the bed. Again, it was a question he’d pondered himself for months, usually after he and Clint had butted heads about his daughter – and once again, the answer didn’t change. “I love him,” he said finally. “And when I look into my future, the only thing I see is him.”

“Not Hanifah?”

Smiling ruefully, Quinn ducked his head. “I don’t want to have to choose, but Tash – you and I both know that Hanifah’s going to be fine, no matter what happens to me. Yasmeen and Amin are good people, and with Kamala watching out for her…” His voice trailed off, and he scrubbed a hand across his face before meeting her eyes again. “I try to imagine a future for me without Clint, and I literally can’t. I know that probably makes me sound pathetic, but I just don’t want to do this without him. I don’t know any other way to explain it.”

He was definitely off his game – his first awareness that Clint had returned was when the archer said, “I don’t think it sounds pathetic at all.” He was leaning against the now-open doorway, looking tired, but somehow…peaceful, Quinn decided. Their eyes met and Clint added, “I think it sounds like something I could sign onto.”

Natasha pushed to her feet with an exaggerated sigh. “I recognize that look – boys, I am out of here.” She leaned in and kissed Quinn on the cheek; he gripped her arm briefly, letting her see his gratitude. Moving to Clint,, she gave him a quick hug, then made a show of handing him Quinn’s phone. “Did you leave Stark in one piece?”

“He’s fine,” Clint sighed, pulling her into his side for another hug and kissing her on the forehead. “I think we might even be friends again.”

“Glad to hear it.”

Once the two of them were alone, Clint raised the phone along with an eyebrow. Quinn rolled his eyes. “Sue me, I was nervous.”

Clint tossed him the phone, then came to sit next to him on the bed. “I’ll tell you anything you want to know about what we talked about, but I have a couple of things I need to get off my chest first, okay?” Quinn nodded, and the archer reached across the space separating them to take his hands. “First and most important – I don’t want you to have to choose between me and the baby…and Hanifah,” he corrected himself. “I know I haven’t made it easy for you, and I’m sorry. I’m going to try and do better.”

The two of them had been at cross purposes for nearly a year over the subject of Quinn’s daughter. Quinn had thrown himself into the only relationship he was allowed, using every moment he could spend with the laughing, healthy, beautiful little girl to avoid dealing with the horror of her conception. Clint had never been given the chance to spend any time with the baby, and given his desire to protect Quinn from everything that had happened, he had ended up _more_ focused on the circumstances of Hanifah’s conception than even Quinn himself had.

It was so complicated, and it shouldn’t have been. Quinn hooked a hand at the back of Clint’s neck and pulled him in for a long, slow, deep kiss. The archer moaned hungrily, pushing up into him until Quinn was on his back on the mattress, Clint crouching over him. “Hi there,” he grinned, looking up into eyes gone dark with arousal.

“Tony Stark can eat his fucking heart out,” Clint growled. Before Quinn could respond his lover was on him again, kissing him hungrily, hands sliding under his shirt, fingers splayed against the planes and ridges of his stomach. A knee pushed between his thighs, forcing his legs apart and putting pressure on his rapidly stiffening cock. “Mine.” Clint’s voice was low and dangerous – his breath hot against Quinn’s skin.

Quinn moved into the weight of Clint’s body. “No argument…” he breathed, surges of pleasure making his vision strobe, “but didn’t you say you had a couple things you wanted to talk about?”

Clint bit hard into the sensitive skin of his neck, just where the curve of his jaw met the line of his ear. Quinn cried out at the sensation, rutting hard against his lover’s denim clad leg. “You seriously want to talk right now?” Quinn blinked, and suddenly his arms were being forced to the mattress, Clint’s hands pinning his wrists in place, the archer leaning his full weight into the hold.

Their eyes met, and Quinn shivered at the intensity of Clint’s gaze. “My jealousy of Tony is my problem, not yours,” he said. “I don’t want to control who you work for or who your friends are. I’m sorry I’ve been an asshole about the whole thing.”

Every inch of Quinn’s body was screaming for him to shut up, take the win, let Clint drive things where he obviously wanted them to go. _A year…_ They’d been at cross purposes for a year, with Tony Stark in the middle of nearly every one of their arguments. Not to mention Clint had a habit of pushing for sex when he was avoiding difficult conversations.

“Details,” he said firmly, letting every bit of his regret show in his expression.

Leaning down, Clint gently kissed the hollow at the base of Quinn’s throat. “I was scared,” he said softly. Another kiss, followed by a quick caress of his tongue. “I couldn’t give you what you were looking for.” A gentle scrape of teeth against his flesh drew a moan from low in Quinn’s throat. “And there was Tony being his hot, perfect Mr. Fixit self, willing to hand you the world on a silver platter.” He pressed his forehead to Quinn’s shoulder, and Quinn felt tears splash against his skin.

Before he could say anything, Clint raised his head, and Quinn saw his storm-colored eyes were flushed with red. “How was I supposed to compete with that?”

Slipping free of Clint’s hold on his wrist, Quinn grabbed his lover by the back of the neck again and forced eye contact. “You don’t,” he said fiercely. “What do I need to say to convince you, Clint?”

The archer smiled, even as tears spilled down his cheeks. “You just did, Quinn. When you talked about the future and us being together…I realized that on some level all those times I’ve joked about you wising up and getting rid of me…” He blew out a shaky breath, clearly overcome with the tangle of his emotions.

“They weren’t jokes,” Quinn finished. “I know. I just couldn’t figure out a way to get through to you.” Pulling Clint down, he kissed him as deeply and thoroughly as he could.

“You believe me now?” he asked, once he finally let the archer up for air.

Clint nodded. “Enough that I’m willing to sign on for the next fifty or sixty years.”

Quinn studied his expression for a long moment, then nodded sharply. “Okay then.” Using his whole body, he leveraged Clint off him and over onto his back. Pushing up into a sitting position, Quinn gave everything over to the hormones still screaming through his body. “Get those clothes off and get your ass up on that mattress, so I can fuck you proper, Clint Barton.”

Clint’s entire face lit with unrestrained joy. “Anything you want,” he said. Pushing up, he kissed Quinn one more time.

“Anything you say.”


End file.
